Step UP

by john clare

In a timid step we tip toed over the egg shells
Taking care not to break any at all,
Kept a safe distance from the bombing range,
Watching for the planes in case they fell.

She said, "Step up to the plate!",
Assuming she knew the rules of our game.
Eyes shut, we flinched to meet the coming fate,
Just when we heard falling,
"You men are all the same!"

In our fields of dreams lays a rubber plate,
We brush and keep it safe from home.
Step up and knock our homers,
Way beyond the bombing ranges,
Going, going, GONE!

And in the breaking of the plate,
It's the price we pay to rid the dust.
The settling down we really hate,
Just dust, but bombs dropping on us.

Come Jimmy

by john clare

Come Jimmy it's time you see
The team is loaded for tonight
We travel down to Cedar Key.
Orville has the boys prepared
Missy can sit up here with me
Mamma will not mind
Come Jimmy, it's time.
When we get to Otter Creek Crossing
We can stretch our legs
Then down through Rosewood
And over those narrow bridges
To the old gym of native rock.
Come Jimmy, it's time you see
For tonight we play Cedar Key
They suit only seven to our ten
But never mind the odds
Those Shark's play as men
Never tiring in their pressing job.
Come Jimmy, it's time you see
It's a long way to Cedar Key
You can say a prayer for the boys
I know they need it bad
Devil's all full of lustful joys
I know you understand the lads.
Come Jimmy, it's time you see
The boy's defeated Cedar Key
Orville coached his cigar out
We played on a prayer and a shout
Gideon's Demon's tumbling rock walls!
Come Jimmy, hurry you see
They block the bridge from Cedar Key!
Have you seen Missy?

Between the Two

Between the two

Before the crying over the dying had even ceased
The celebration of the budding of the bloom had begun
The dirge and the hearse upon one limb
The parade and the gaiety upon another one,

And I am left standing awkwardly between them.

The newborn bud beside the dying leaf.
In haste to grow and go on to new life
In haste to end a season so terminally brief
One as life giving scalpel, the other as murderous knife.

And I am cut in my love between the two.

Mourning the dying of the leaves from the trees,
While rejoicing in the coming forth of the new
For who can recall the life of but one who leaves?
Or stay the bud that unfolds before you?

I believe in the winter I shall forever dwell
No bud or leaf between and all is well.

by john clare

Contrail upon the trail

I've gotten up off the forested floor

I

Assez vite

Why wait the Spring
Go ahead and sing
You who bloomed
Much too soon
Giving us a song
In the winter long
Your time came
You sang and sang
Few heard a word
No early bird
Or butterfly emerged
At your urging
Weeks from hence
When glories cover
the fence
And hummers alight
in Springs delight
I shall remember the day
Brush the leaves away
And thank you for blooming
In the cold,cold gloom.

Looking unto Jesus

Be Kind to clouds

The clouds crowd for but a glimpse of the earth bound below, but they cannot linger long upon the sight for on they are driven by the rustling winds, always to the cloud pens and then to the cloudy arena where they are prodded out and the four winds bid to herd the clouds through their vastly expanding heavenly ranges. And so for some they are sold to storm and thunder to cast asunder those below, while others are twisted and branded into tornadic fury even worse. Yet a few, a very few escape from the herd and hiding by morning concealed in the lingering fog, stay long and gaze upon those below, shading and enveloping them from the sun that comes, exposing them to the rustlers of the wind.
Be kind to the clouds that gently speak with you by making all sorts of words for you to decipher. They once were the fiercely driven hurricanes tearing over the open ranges.

Be Kind to Clouds